This week on the farm

Shorter Daylight means we see the sunrise a little more often now. It’s a beautiful way to start the day on the lettuce crop.

We are a few weeks past our initial freeze, but that doesn’t put a stop to the happenings at the farm. Mornings are starting a little bit later, with less to pick and less daylight to see it in so that is nice for the field crew. The rest of the team is just as busy as ever.

Indian Summer means lettuce is still growing and we are having some amazing days of harvesting.

The last few days of Indian Summer have kept the Ice Cream Stand hopping. We are planning on keeping it open until Halloween, so be sure to get your jimmy and frappe fixes while there is still time.

Cameo is a beautiful guest to our apple festivity.

We still have around 30 varieties of apples on hand. This week saw some of the pie favorites dry up, but fresh tastes like Cameo make an appearance. We hope to have some new tastes later this week as well. Check out what we have on hand here: Apple Page.

Purple and Orange are a great combo, and normally spring bound pansies are having a moment with cool temps. Dress up your pumpkin patch with some color too!

The greenhouse is still chock full of blooming mums, and fall annuals, including a fresh shipment of fall pansies, perfect flowers for cool weather color. You’ll also find hundreds of pumpkins for perusal in and around the greenhouse as well as out in front of the farmstand near the Hay Man. While pumpkins are prevalent this year, it shouldn’t keep you from picking out yours soon. Carving time is at hand!

I love Romanesco Cauliflower so much, I am showing it too you again. This is just one of 8 varieties and four colors of cauliflower we grow. Also worth note this week is Chef Todd’s Cauliflower and Cauliflower Mushroom Gratin in the prepared foods section.

The field, despite the freeze, does have quite a bit to offer still. Broccoli and cauliflower are arriving steadily from our Standish Field. We have several crops of lettuce at hand, that we plan on bringing in as long as weather allows. Hopefully you’ve noticed the return of homegrown cabbage to the stand, plus our fall only Chinese Cabbage.

The salad turnips that are so sweet and even great raw that were such a hit in early summer are back as well, though only limited as we were only testing them out as a fall crop.

Salad Turnips, in white here, but also available in red.

The parsnips are still going strong as well, and we should have enough to harvest them til the ground freezes. A new vegetable also hit the stand this week. Our homegrown Flower Sprouts were a fun and unique trial crop this year. They are a cross of brussels sprouts and kale that result in tiny florets that are great when stir fried, roasted or treated in any of the methods you would to either of the parent vegetables. This special food is proving to be fairly inefficient to grow in the field, so if you love it make sure we know!

It is going to be wonderful to be open for the entire holiday season this year, and to be providing fresh produce and prepared foods to our loyal customers. As part of our look into what to offer this season the deli has been working toward getting its catering platters figured out. We look forward to presenting you with options for both deli and cheese platters soon. If you are interested please contact the deli, and we will hopefully have more information readily available on the web soon.

Deli and cheese platters available soon!

Just one more reminder that this Tuesday, Oct 23, we will close an hour early so that we can co-host an event with Babson College for Food Day. We are sorry for the inconvenience, but excited for the opportunity to introduce our farm to some of the finest chefs around. Looking forward to sharing some of the festivities with you soon.

In addition to some of the attendees to this event, we know there are quite a few customers visiting us for the first time this fall. We can’t wait to welcome you. Just a quick note on how to find us. The easiest path from major highways is to take exit 19B off 128, turning right at the third set of lights onto West Street. Follow to the end and turn left on Central Ave. Volante Farms is on the right. See you soon!